WEDDING FLOWERS: Nobel Prizes
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Showing posts with label Nobel Prizes. Show all posts
Showing posts with label Nobel Prizes. Show all posts

Royal Fashion Awards: The Nobel Prizes, 2014 (UPDATED)

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Phew. There’s a lot going on right now. We’ll check in with Monaco’s big news tomorrow, but for now, we have tiaras to deal with. The Nobel Prize ceremonies happened yesterday in Oslo and Stockholm and the Norwegian and Swedish royal families were out in force. Obviously these events are about the Nobel laureates and not the royals, but as usual, I'll stay in my wheelhouse. (With one exception: I will share this article about the gown worn by laureate May-Britt Moser and its special significance, which I think is pretty cool.) Now, to the awards – and this is a long one, so settle in…

Best in Standards: Non-Tiara Division
The Norwegian Royal Family
The Oslo ceremony is for the Nobel Peace Prize and understandably omits the fancy tiara-wearing dress code (it’s also held earlier in the day), and we usually get a pretty standard showing from King Harald, Queen Sonja, Crown Prince Haakon, and Crown Princess Mette-Marit. Mette-Marit wore the same headpiece (we won’t call it a hat) with a white outfit just a couple years ago, but it’s one of her standards that suits her particularly well. She also stuck to her standards by wearing one of her floral prairie dresses for the evening dinner (click here to see), but somehow I don't mind this one as much as I usually mind her covered wagon business. Anyway, a passing grade to all.
A couple screencaps including a look at Mette-Marit's hairdo, and Sonja's velvet jacket from Emilio Pucci. Mette-Marit's coat is from Valentino.

Over in Sweden, the rest of the prizes are given out in one of the most formal events of the year and the Swedish royal family was up to the task, turning out in force.
So many family members were present (the King, Queen, all three children with their respective significant others, plus Princess Christina and her husband) that only four members were on stage and everyone else had to join Christina in her usual spot in the front row.

Best in Standards: Tiara Division
Queen Silvia and Princess Christina
Queen Silvia has worn a variety of tiaras for the Nobel ceremony, but her two most frequent choices are the Leuchtenberg Sapphires and the Nine Prong Tiara. She picked the sapphires this year for the main event and I am ever so thankful for that. Princess Christina also went with her usual, the Six Button Tiara. And as I always say, if someone has to wear ye olde buttons, let it be Christina, since she makes the most of them.
A very shiny and embellished dress for Silvia, also a standard (for better or for worse).

Best in Nobel Spirit
Crown Princess Victoria
Queen Silvia has toned down her Nobel looks as time goes on, and it’s nice to know that someone is picking up the slack. Hello, Victoria! This is a proper ball gown if there ever was one. You know I love it and all its OTT splendor, including the fact that she had trouble moving around in it. (Dedication to the splendor cause, man!) It was designed by Pär Engsheden, her wedding dress designer.
She also delivered on the jewel front, finally bringing back the Baden Fringe Tiara and continuing her recent streak of debuting something new to her for each Nobel season. This year, it was the large diamond cross from the family collection, worn by Victoria for the first time. She also sported a large diamond bracelet, ruby brooch on her front, small brooch on her back, diamond earrings, and diamond lozenge brooch in her hair.

Most Curious in Nobel Spirit
Princess Madeleine
I want to like this but I’m finding it so curious. She did go big for the occasion, opting for an embellished dress from Fadi El Khoury (a designer I’ve longed to see the royals wear more often). But the print is almost an animal print, but not quite; the dress is almost a full skirt ball gown, but not quite.
She used most of Queen Josephine’s Amethyst Parure (earrings, brooch, bracelet), but stuck to the Modern Fringe Tiara. Almost, but not quite.

Best Tiara Potential
Sofia Hellqvist
Let’s get this out of the way: the dress (by Ida Sjostedt), it’s not great. In these photos, I think it looks quite fine actually. But on television, under the lights, it suffered from a serious case of S.O.S. Yes, Sequin Overload Syndrome. And I say this as someone who would like nothing more than to see her show up looking classy as can be and blow all her haters out of the water.* But luckily, something else did catch my eye: that hair!
She hasn’t been issued anything from the family vault yet (that brooch, whatever it’s made of, is certainly not part of the historic pink topaz set, as some originally guessed) but she’s all ready to go, hair brooch and all. I’m looking forward to next year already!

For more Nobel fun:

The tiara fest in Sweden isn’t over just yet – this evening is the King’s Dinner for the laureates at the palace. Stay tuned. The Norwegians still have the Nobel concert to go. Until then…

Who was your best dressed for Nobel 2014?


*Since posts including Sofia tend to end up with comments that dip into personal feelings about her background, let me just issue a friendly preemptive note for my lovely commenters: Let’s not go there.


UPDATE: Night #2 of Nobel festivities!
In Sweden, the traditional King’s Dinner for the Nobel laureates was held at the palace. You can click here for a gallery.
Queen Silvia came down with a case of ADLD (Another Dang Lace Dress, it’s been going around. Like the flu, but prettier) and matched it with the Connaught Tiara. Sofia Hellqvist toned down her sequin dress for a grade of Most Improved and she wore another brooch in her hair – but like last night, the palace stated that she wore private jewels. (You can see her hair embellishment here.)
Both Crown Princess Victoria and Princess Madeleine repeated last night’s tiaras, as did Princess Christina (I FROWN IN YOUR GENERAL DIRECTION, LADIES) (THOUGH I AM ALSO GLAD TO SEE THESE AGAIN INSTEAD OF THE FOUR BUTTON OR THE CUT STEEL BANDEAU, SO MAYBE I’M NOT THAT UPSET). Madeleine gave us déjà vu to a dress recently worn by her sister, and Victoria stuck a bow on it.
How you wear that dress without feeling like the angel in the Christmas play, I don’t know (maybe that is what you feel like and maybe that’s the point), but I applaud her bringing back the corsage necklace used by Princess Lilian, even if it’s not the best with this neckline.

And over in Norway, Crown Prince Haakon, Crown Princess Mette-Marit, and their children attended the Nobel Peace Prize Concert. And Mette-Marit wore a dress adorned with frolicking magical creatures, because of course she did.
UNICORNS AND CHERUBS, people. And let me tell you something: I AM ALL FOR IT. (This busy royal week has driven me to caps lock mania. It’s not my fault.) This dress comes from British brand Mother of Pearl (via Minmote). Victoria went for a fairytale vibe with last night’s mega ball gown and now Mette-Marit’s going for a more literal interpretation. And I’m not kidding - I really am totally charmed by a dress covered in unicorns. The world needs more unicorn prints.


Photos: Getty Images as indicated, SVT video, Lyst, Kungahuset.se, Moda Operandi

Royal Closet Raid of the Day: December 8

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It's shaping up to be a busy royal week, and I thought we'd kick it off with a little excitement for the sparkliest event coming our way: the Nobel Prize Ceremony, on the 10th. And to do that, another in our series of closet raids is in order. This time we're stealing borrowing admiring respectfully items from the wonder of Queen Silvia's wardrobe.

Silvia has all the age-appropriate daywear you could ask for, but she also has years and years of some of the most spectacular royal gowns around. There's a selection there no matter what your age - just ask her daughter Princess Madeleine, who borrowed one of the gowns worn to the Nobel Prize Ceremony for her wedding reception!
The Nobel ceremony dress archives are the real treasure trove here, and I think I might have to go with 1999's grand number from Jacques Zehnder (one of Silvia's favorite designers), a light pink silk brocade woven with gold roses and featuring a serious train at the back. Gotta have that train, that's one of the things Silvia's best at.
And I might also be swayed here by her use of the majestic pink topaz and diamond demi-parure from the family collection - drool. The set dates from the early 1800s in Russia, where it belonged to Grand Duchess Maria Pavlovna. Made of pink topaz stones surrounded by diamonds and set in gold and silver, the demi-parure includes a necklace with pendants, earrings, and two brooches (one smaller and one larger with a pendant). It's featured in the book Jewels from Imperial St. Petersburg by Ulla Tillander-Godenhielm, where its roots are described as such:
"The set was a gift by Dowager Empress Maria Feodorovna to her daughter Maria on the occasion of the birth of her second daughter, Augusta. It was inherited by Augusta (1811-1900), later Queen of Prussia and Empress of Germany. She passed it on to her daughter Luise (1838-1923), Grand Duchess of Baden, who in her turn bequeathed it to her daughter Viktoria (1866-1929), Queen of Sweden."
And it has remained in Sweden ever since, where it is currently worn exclusively by Queen Silvia. She uses it as a grand accompaniment to her diamond tiaras, as illustrated in some striking new portraits recently released by the royal court:
Gorgeous. Just wrap those up and we'll be good, actually. But - back on track now - if you need gown inspiration, the Nobel organization has the details on the Queen's gowns, and here's a fun video with many of the Nobel years in a quick flash:
And now, my question to you...

If you could have one thing from Silvia's wardrobe, what would it be? 

Photos: Nobel Prize video, De Kongelige Julever video, Anna-Lena Ahlström / kungahuset.se

Royal Outfit of the Day: April 4

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Crown Princess Victoria wore a custom Elie Saab gown in beige silk with embroidered and beaded details on the bust and sleeves to the Nobel Prize Awards Ceremony in 2010. She also wore the Cut Steel Tiara.
Bit of a dismal run from Victoria in the current events department lately. Dismal bordering on disastrous, occasionally. And I've had a few requests to pull something, anything, out of the archives to remind us of the full force of her sartorial power. So here we go, one of the all-time bests.

Video: Victoria at the Nobel dinner
It's the best outing of the Cut Steel Tiara I can think of, and it gives me an opportunity to once again post an enlightening video - you might not guess that a tiara with no diamonds or other gemstones could possess such sparkle. I can only imagine that the gown was made specifically to accompany the Cut Steel Tiara, because it is a perfect modern interpretation of the type of dress that was the fashion in the Napoleonic era, when the tiara was crafted. Victoria has worn this dress again, but this appearance remains the gold standard.

Photos: Getty Images/All Over Press/Kungahuset

Tiara Watch: The Nobel Prizes, 2013

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The Nobel Prize Award Ceremony in Stockholm is one of the most glittering occasions of the year - usually. This year was a bit sparse, though, because two of the royal ladies had to miss the event: Princess Madeleine declined due to her advanced pregnancy, and Crown Princess Victoria instead flew to South Africa to attend the memorial service for Nelson Mandela. (Don't you just hate when people remind you that there are things more important than sparkle and frill?!) The King, Queen, Prince Daniel, and Prince Carl Philip made up a small group on the stage.

We did still get our required tiara alert, though. Actually, make that a Party Antler Alert.
Queen Silvia opted for a Nobel favorite, the Nine Prong Tiara (this was predictable, since she gave us the sapphires last year). Ye Olde Pronger may not be my favorite, but even I have to admit it brings the sparkle - as does Silvia's dress, a repeat from Princess Madeleine's pre-wedding dinner. It still has a bit of the figure skater feel to it thanks to that top, but I like to imagine she was just trying to give us as much flash as she could since she was carrying things without her daughters.

Video: The entrance to the banquet, and some sparkle in action. The award ceremony in full can be viewed by clicking here.
Well, she wasn't entirely alone, of course: Princess Christina was there! (The King's sister is a regular attendee, along with her husband, but they sit in the audience and not on the stage for the ceremony.) She wore the Six Button Tiara - again, not one of my favorites, but also again, completely predictable. She seems to stick to either the Cut Steel Tiara or the larger button thing. And she happens to be one that can make the buttons look okay, so that works out.

And though they don't have any tiaras associated with their part of the Nobel Prizes, we'll add here the Norwegian contribution. The Nobel Peace Prize was awarded in Oslo, and again a reduced royal group was on hand. We would usually see the Crown Prince and Crown Princess, but Mette-Marit is still in recovery and Haakon was also in South Africa for the Mandela memorial, so the King and Queen went solo.
Click here to view the entire ceremony.
Sonja did hold down the fort in her smart red and black, though. Basic, but you'll note she threw in some hat sparkle, just for us (let's pretend).

Update: Victoria returned in time for the second tiara event of the Swedish Nobels, and she brought a surprise:
She's wearing bits of the Cameo parure for the first time since her wedding! It makes a surprisingly good pairing with the Cut Steel Tiara, though it makes me long for the Cameo Tiara to be worn again. (And for the record, I like the idea of that dress, which is a repeat...I just think it's unfortunate that it's also a dress that speculation lovers adore as well. A reminder: our comment policy around here requests that you avoid the pregnancy speculation.) Silvia wore the Connaught Tiara, and Christina wore the Six Button Tiara for the second night in a row.

Photos: SVT/Getty Images/Nobel Prize/Scanpix/Tt

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